Every day, thousands of people check in and out of hotels. In our ever-connected world, that also means they’re Instagramming their view, checking in on Facebook, and Tweeting about their experience. The hospitality industry as a whole has a lot to gain with the boom in content creation, and these four hotels are taking notice.
Ritz-Carlton & Instagram
Ritz-Carlton’s Instagram is a travel-lover’s dream, consisting in large part of stunning guest photo submissions. They encourage guests to tag their photos with #RCMemories for a chance to be featured on their account. By incorporating UGC photos into its marketing campaign, they produce authentic content for its fans to enjoy while sharing positive guest experiences. The customers also enjoy having their photos shared– it puts the spotlight on them and makes them feel special. It’s a win-win situation all around, and is an easily applicable strategy for almost any brand.
Marriott & Facebook
The international hotel chain puts all the focus on customers.
“Most brands put themselves at the center of the story, but that’s not the authentic story,” Michelle Lapierre, Senior Director of Customer Experience and Social Media at Marriott Rewards, said during the Visual Revolution Summit.
Their Facebook page consists of photos submitted by guests while staying at their hotel, rather than the typical hotel stock photography. Lapierre found that this customer interaction led to trust and uniqueness, the two hardest areas for brands to achieve. By featuring your customers’ photos, your content will stand out among your competitors since they were captured by a diverse group of guests.
Four Seasons & Pinterest
Four Seasons emphasizes creating innovative campaigns around their brand, particularly on Pinterest. Pin.Pack.Go is a trip planning service that connects guests with Four Seasons experts around the world to collaborate on vacation boards. Four Seasons becomes part of the planning process, with the Place Pins feature allowing users to view their boards as a map. The hotel brand is able to set itself as an industry leader by providing numerous resources, including local experts for guidance and over 70 property pages for different occasions.
The Four Seasons Bridal Page is a prime example of curating content that peaks consumers’ interests (in this case, those of the brides), and associating it with the brand. This brand goes above and beyond to engage with its audience through visuals, while making itself the go-to brand for destination wedding resources. The results are pretty impressive too: the hotel has seen a 1000 percent increase in daily average visitors and a 1700 percent increase in daily average clicks to its website from Pinterest.
Hyatt & Twitter
Hyatt Hotels & Resorts’ focus is on providing round the clock customer support that guests can depend on. They first launched @HyattConcierge, Twitter’s first real-time global hotel concierge service. Whether customers share photos or bring up a concern, the Hyatt team responds quickly with anything from a simple “thanks” to fixing booking problems.
By making it extremely easy to interact with the brand, Hyatt has successfully made its brand seem approachable and reliable. Guests know that customer service is only a tweet away, and this kind of positive image is valuable, especially in the hospitality industry.
Hotels, and other brands in the hospitality industry, are part of the driving force behind the customer service movement happening on social media. These brands have done a fantastic job at not just being present online, but also being a source for inspiration and support.
Let us know if there’s a hotel doing amazing work on social in the comments below or on Twitter! We’d love to hear your own experiences.